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 Pyeatt wrote:
Man, It's all about the Space Wolves, Bruvah!!

So awesome that they may have erased up to 2 corrupted legions? And the Wolves have the best fluff, ESPECIALLY pre-heresy. All stone cold killers on the outside, and rough brother dogs to each other.

Vikings in space? I think so man. If I could be born into the 40k universe, I know I'd want to be on Fenris, somehow survive a huge battle and get picked up by a Rune Priest.

Of course I know if I were to be magically born into a 40k universe, my parents would hate me and turn me into a darned baby Cherub servitor... (thats how it works right?)

But anyways... Wolves for the Wolf God!

Wolf wolf wolf.

wolf lord on a thunder wolf with a wolf token and a wolf claw and a wolf claw and fenrisian wolf bodyguards followed by wolf guard with wolf claws.

Add a batch of flanking with Wolf Scouts, and I'll take 2, please.

wolf lord on a thunderwolf with a wolf tokan and a wolf claw and a wolf claw and fenrisian wolf bodygiards and wolf guard with wolf claws and flanking wolf scouts and a wolf lord on a thunder wolf with a wolf tokan and a wolf claw and a wolf claw and fenrisian wolf bodyguards and wolf guard with wolf claws and flanking wolf scouts.
I DARE you to say that three times fast.

The multipart plastic kits are hard to beat if you like the aesthetic- River Trolls and Plague Bearers are two I've recently put together which are fantastic.

And their WETA inspired LOTR/Hobbit range of plastics are excellent too.

Having branched out into other games, I can appreciate the easy of assembly and the joy of working with GW's well designed plastics all the more.

I also mostly use GW paints because I am familiar with them but also because they are a decent product.

The fiction produced around the games, though of variable quality, has produced some gems- most of ADB's stuff is excellent, quite a lot of Dan Abnett's stuff is also really enjoyable to read.

And the last thing they did, which is hard to express exactly, is that they got this huge scale of a universe, with so much diversity in worlds, still expressed with common themes between all of them. So that if you want dark gothic sci fi, it's got every flavour from high tech to post apocalyptic, to faux fantasy "forgotten science", it's all there, it's all coherent, and I can take my mob of orks or army of space knights and play a game in any of these settings without difficulty.

The customization possibilities are great. If you can chop it, you can convert it. And whatever you build is 99% likely to be useable by at least one army. With unbound, it's useable by any army. Other games (almost all of the bigger names) have better rules. GW doesn't care about rules at all, so they make crappy ones. But they do make awesome (usually) sculpts that are highly customizable. Kitbashing isn't just an action, it's a religion.

Their kits since they are fun to work with, customize, and kitbash with them. Although I usually do this to make some models for their 'Specialist' Games since those are the ones I enjoy more in the universe. The other is their universe, despite kind of ripping off other things and the later fluff being meh, I still find it fun and unique for a black parody of sorts.. Although their main game is crap, I'll take FFG's rpgs and their LCG over base 40k and fantasy that Games Workshop comes out with.

I find it amusing that there needs to be a heavily policed GW positivity thread.

Most of the positives that have already been mentioned are common to many other wargames.

The core, and by now possibly only, good thing about 40k and GW in general is the background.

40K fluff creates a world that is not only interesting but well crafted with enough ambiguity to encourage rather than stifle player creativity. The new fluff is pretty much hopeless but the framework is extremely solid.

The same is also true for Fantasy although it isn't as strong.

This thread got me thinking so much about this that I expanded my previous posting into an essay on my club's blog.

http://chicagoskirmish.blogspot.com/2014/06/in-praise-of-warhammer-40000-and-games.html

For me, this thread is more of a wake, where you only speak of the good things and paint a pretty picture that doesn't show the more complex reality of the deceased.

Another thing which came to mind that I find good was True Line of Sight.

Although it can cause problems and sometimes you must define eyes etc, I still get a more realistic feel to it. There is a little thrill about trying to look through the eyes of your model, as if you are really standing there. When I first started 40k, I remember that I was quite impressed with this rule. I was wondering how you could have coherent rules around it.

This may not be exclusive to 40k but I find t to be a thing good about it. There is abuse like modelling for advantage but like anything out there, abuse will creep in after a while. I trust that gamers are an intelligent bunch. it's almost like rule 34. Hmmm hope I got the rule right.

My Good Thoughts about the Ork Codex:
Stompa is in the Codex.
The Orks have really interesting Formations. While costly for the most part, they are still really cool.
Ork Clans went from Quarter of a page descriptions back in 4th to Half Page descriptions with a showcase story and full color character pictures for each Clan.
Painboyz can go into any squads now. And Mad Dok is fieldable without worrying about your opponent kite-ing him.
Playing with 'Ere We Go! actually made me feel stronger in Close Combat as I could chance those long charges.
Plastic Meganobs, while not too much cheaper than the old versions comes with a lot more bitz and pieces.
Stormboyz in squads of 30 with a points drop.
Deffkoptas are cheaper, and I have 3 squads of them that I got for cheap.
I can take Squads of up to 6 Killa Kanz. And the new Cowardly Grotz rule makes me like taking a deffdread and using him as the Kill Kan's Sergeant.
Lootas are better, but as Heavy Support choices I can't spam them as much because...
I want to field FLASH GITS! They look like mobile weapons platforms to me, and they have pretty good stats too.

All in all I am happy with my new codex.

The way the background invokes the imagination. When I play a game I can really see a horde of Orks charging forwards as my battle lines try to shoot as many as they can before they get there.

The way you can customise your army. There must be unlimited army lists. Nothing else I have seen has the same level of customisation.

Again, the background. It's so rich, and satisfying to my soul. It's also a great parody of real life.

When three or four Space Wolves miraculously kill fifteen or so Guardsmen (this actually happened recently), and pull the win with three men standing.

Meeting cool like minded people, who love the setting as much as I do.

So the majority of positive posts are people voicing their opinion on the artistic style and background of 40k.
Considering GW has been working on the game system for over quarter of a century, one might expect a distinctive style and deep background.

And the rest of the positives seem to revolve around like minded people agreeing on how they enjoy their version of 40k.

Which applies to any table top game played by a group of people.

This thread is the war gaming version of 'say something nice about a person you have ''issues'' with.'

And the bulk of the replies were;_
'Well they have nice hair, er um er, and fresh breath.Yes nice hair and fresh breath!'


I think the background is inspirational too.And the artistic style appeals to me.And I have to stop there as well!

But by far the best part about 40k is reading the sarcastic comments on Dakkadakka, where people are pretending to be polite so they don't get in trouble with the mods.

 Kavish wrote:
But by far the best part about 40k is reading the sarcastic comments on Dakkadakka, where people are pretending to be polite so they don't get in trouble with the mods.

Like yours?

To sum up the thread: Pretty much the only good things about 40k is the background/lore and the general quality of the figures with few exceptions.

Everything else is bad because GW is a terrible company with worse business practices that basically fleece their customers and treat them like brainwashed suckers.

Well, it was too good to last I suppose, before this thread gets taken over again.

On topic, another good thing I like about GW is the good customer service. Quite a lot of my friends have had items posted to them at no extra costs, as long as the original product was defective. I've had one experience too and generally they were quite responsive.

 Sigvatr wrote:
Serioulsy though, what is to be kept in mind is that internet forums do not reflect the 40k playership as a whole, far from it. On about every topic, you will find more negative posts on the internet as it serves as a vent for people and you are more likely to look for people agreeing with your negative views because you want to make sure that you are right and the problem is you.

Slightly off-topic but still related I just wanted to point out an observation.

I am on quite a few forums in relation to other games and there is no company that generates as much vitrol as GW. I dare anyone to find one other game, or wargaming company, that generate more criticism than genuine excitement than GW. I have been a GW customer for 22 years, things have NEVER been as bad as they have in the last few years.

Quite frankly, GW has without question:



The fact of the matter is GW has earned this themselves. Every other company engages with their customer base and tries to provide a quality product that customers want to buy. GW is the sole exception where it has become blatantly obvious they see their customer as nothing more than stupid wallets to fleece, charging premium prices for sub-par products.

As for me personally, I have nothing left to defend GW on. The 7th edition stinks, the models have become over-sized cartoon monstrosities and the prices.... well, I'm not even going to go there. GW no longer cares about their customers, so my question would be why should their customer even give two pence of care about them anymore?

Funny enough, I still care. I love this game, and no matter what some random guy on the internet with an ax to grind, imagined or earned, I'm still going to buy their products and play the game.

I love the game. 6th edition was not the end of the world as I knew it. I've enjoyed several 6th edition games, and I expect the same from 7th edition.

I love Warhammer too, and I'm going to continue playing it no matter what for years to come. I don't like GW's business practices though. If there's something I want, I'll just save up until I have enough to get it. I'm in no hurry to build a massive army. I always look for other ways to get my figures first. The GW store is my last resort, their products are out of the price range at which I'm willing to buy. And if its the only way, like I said, a few more months of saving is nothing to me.

Also, I play with friends and family, so we make our own rules for the game. We throw out the points system and fix the stats of all troops so one type of troop is equal to its counterpart. That being said, we keep in the special rules and generally follow the codex for everything else. No ones ever complained, and we're all satisfied.

 Wayshuba wrote:
I am on quite a few forums in relation to other games and there is no company that generates as much vitrol as GW. I dare anyone to find one other game, or wargaming company, that generate more criticism than genuine excitement than GW.

Do video games count? Because you should see battlelog for Battlefield 4. 2 out of 3 comments are "fix the game" or "finish the game". It's sad, but it seems to be the direction the business world is going. Once a company goes public things are a lot less friendly.

Hah, I love how some of you, guys, come over here just to bring their air of GW/40k bashing even though the thread is explicitly stated to not want such comments. :') I respect everyone on Dakka, but seeing you come over with your sarcastic and/or bleak comment(no matter how gently worded) clearly meant to criticize the game and/or it's developer in yet another thread for the sake of your wicked little crusade is just way too low. Especially you, MWHistorian. Please, don't take it as a personal attack, I'm just trying to appeal to you. I respect you as a person as you seem to be pretty reasonable, but you're taking it a bit too far. It feels like in every possible thread even remotely related to 40k as a game or GW there's 95% chance that you'll come over and, 1 - preach on how you quit in favour of Warmachine, 2 - try to prove everyone who enjoys the game wrong and rub that "other games are better" in their faces mercilessly while actively trying to drive them away into other titles(as you even admitted that you do it on purpose in one thread). Somehow it really turned into some kind of Dakka circlejerk pattern with, most often, the same few guys involved. Not saying that it's unprovoked as there are also extremes on the other side, but it's not healthy with either.

If OP wants a thread about positive things with the game please, don't barge in and make sarcastic/negative remarks. It's clearly a thread you guys should steer clear from if you can't contribute anything nice as he asked in the original post. :-)

Now moving onto the topic - what I like about 40k...

Well, the biggest part is the hobby aspects - I am a huge, huge fan of the customizability of models. When I open a box I don't think about how great it'll perform on the table, I look at the bits I can use on those(and other) models, I look at the casting quality, possible conversion ideas and ability to give them some cool poses that noone else came up with on unique, kitbashed models. Converting stuff is my religion now. I even have a Sentinel holding an autocannon like a rifle like those exo suits from Avatar because why not? And kitbashed HQs... man, dem HQs!

Another thing is obviously the fluff. 40k is one of the best-established and original universes and over all those years GW managed to create a rich, interesting backstory for all it's factions and gave everyone a purpose. Of course some ideas are better than others and most of them apply to particular player's personal preferences as some people might not like particular armies, but pretty much everyone can find something he'll like and the fluff will make him root for that faction. My only gripe with 40k's fluff is that GW could make it progress at a bit faster pace, but it doesn't matter in the long run, the game is about the here and now in 41st millennium!

I also like the gameplay - 40k is a very simple and fast game that, in most cases, is all about point and click and rolling buckets of dice, making it great as a beer and pretzels game with friends. Especially given the fact that my local community is very mature and if they feel like bringing cheese to the table, they'll warn you and/or ask if you're okay with that. Bonus points when you 'forge a narrative' with the opponent, thinking up a possible explanation for the conflict, giving the characters names and/or trying to come up with some nice idea behind the objectives as a little bit of immersion with your carefully assembled and painted plastic men can really make it ten times better.

And that brings me to my main point - immersion. It's really fantastic that there are so many people that care about their army being fluffy. I always encourage people to try to personalize it, to make it unique and to give it some distinct fluff(or at least immerse themselves in some existing one) as it goes a very long way with enjoying the game. Of course there are those that only care about the gameplay and they could just as well play with cardboard boxes roughly the size of their miniatures, but I think that the strongest point of the game lies in immersion. The fluff is grea and it gives a lot of ideas on what kind of force your army can be, you can have awesome stuff happening and making up background for it.. just like the one time I was playing Hobbit and a lone Grim Hammer making his final stand against several orcs in a narrow passage to buy his friends time, winning the combat for few turns in a row and taking down five orcs with him. When he finally died we marked his base and he'll be painted to be a captain rather than a regular Grim Hammer warrior thanks to his efforts. Of course that can happen in every single game, but 40k with it's fluff is much more likely to have such awesome situations happening(although sometimes on the squad level rather than single model). Add some awesome, big machines like Stompas, Knights and flyers and you'll have very unique game with some seriously epic stuff happening.

Overall I enjoy 40k a lot and I still believe that while I might enjoy other titles, no other game will ever take 40k's niche. The game is best served chilled with addition of reasonable opponents and healthy attitude.

I'm sorry if I sounded a bit harsh in the first part, no offense meant.

 insaniak wrote:
I'm going to pre-empt things a little here and ask that people make an effort to stick to the topic. There is no need to bash those who hold a different opinion to your own - whichever side of the fence you find yourself on.

If you have something positive to contribute, go nuts.

Thanks.

The fact that many people slate GW isn't a bad thing; it means people care about them, like they do their parents, or the government they voted for. It would be worse if they were simply ignored.

The success of GW is testified to by the fact that, say, a mere Ork thread gets 10 times as many pages as a Warmachine thread. Or that an "I hate GW and I'm going to play another game" gets far more posts than any thread about that other game.

When it comes down to it, GW built the world around which dakkadakka is based. For all the mistakes, and bureaucracy, they've given more people more fun times than any of their rivals ever have, and probably more than any rival ever will.

The number of exalts for this thread probably does show that many people are still into 40k.

I've got another thing to contribute. I have been reading the rules for other game systems so perhaps that's why thoughts of what I find good keep popping up.

Movement in difficult terrain. I started in 6th Ed mainly so I can't comment about what happened before. I like a random roll to determine your movement in difficult terrain. As compared to moving at half speed as long as you are within terrain etc.

This is because, back in the days when I played WHFB, I used to have to do complicated maths like "so I marched at 10, I moved 4.2 inches till I touched the forest, then to move through the forest I can move a further (10-42.)/2 inches which is 2.9 inches. But since I only clip about 1.3 inches of forest, I would then get an extra (2.9-1.3)x2 inches which is 3.2 inches after I clear the forest......whew!" Well, you get the point.

So I found the random roll neater and faster and less finicky. WHFB may have changed, I wouldn't know, since I stopped at the edition when Steadfast came out. But this is just to illustrate this mechanic.

I remember reading a fluff story in the 2nd edition Chaos Codex about a group of ragtag Chaos veterans marching out of the desert to attack a small, poorly armed outpost (or maybe it was a farm?). The guards had such feeble weapons that bounced off the skull covered power armor. The whole story was very tense and evocative. I've tried to capture that type of feel in early 2nd edition 40k games.

Some of the fluff is garbage and cheesy, but some of it is very memorable, even after all these years.

 Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:

The success of GW is testified to by the fact that, say, a mere Ork thread gets 10 times as many pages as a Warmachine thread. Or that an "I hate GW and I'm going to play another game" gets far more posts than any thread about that other game.

Yes but all things being equal those threads would almost certainly have been longer in the past. GW undoubtedly has a smaller market share today than at any time since the early/mid 90's so comparing 40k threads against warmachine threads is all very well but it doesn't really mean all that much.

 Palindrome wrote:

 Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:

The success of GW is testified to by the fact that, say, a mere Ork thread gets 10 times as many pages as a Warmachine thread. Or that an "I hate GW and I'm going to play another game" gets far more posts than any thread about that other game.

Yes but all things being equal those threads would almost certainly have been longer in the past.

Half those posts are negative. I'm not sure that's a good measure to go by. When I want to talk Warmachine, I go to their forum.

I am going to focus on ForgeWorld - the one part of GW that I can fullheartedly endorse.

I really like what they have done with the miniatures, and with rules expansions into eras of the WH40K setting that have been established, but never elaborated upon - their Horus Heresy material is top notch.

I will be honest - a lot of the things that I like best about GW settings are in the past.

The fluff is good, but, in my opinion, has been damaged by the three ring binder approach to setting history - but the further back you look the less corporate meddling has damaged the setting - and Forge World tries to reconcile the old fluff with the new, sometimes to great effect.

The Auld Grump

I just got back into 40k. I hadn't played in a long time but I'm having more fun now than I ever did before. I like what 7th gave us the options to do, and the fact that it says you and your opponent must agree to the armies if you're bringing some crazy/cheesy list to the table. I'm not a big fan of GW pricing or business practices but guess what, those thoughts have never once crossed my mind while throwing dice and shooting/hacking my enemies apart. I like the fluff also and this is coming from a space wolves player. Yes, it would be nice if they could come up with something other than "wolfy mcwolferson wolfed with his wolfy wolves" but the idea of space vikings who are equally good at shooting, close combat, drinking, and fething she wolves is still pretty cool. People can hate all they want, I have no problem finding a game every time I go to the store even if it's on a Wednesday at 13:00 and having a blast while playing whether I win, lose or draw.